The Patient Test Result Information Act – commonly referred to as Act 112 – now requires Pennsylvania imaging entities to directly communicate with patients if the entity finds “significant abnormalities” in the patient’s test results, as well as to continue to follow normal reporting procedure to inform the ordering physician. The catalyst for this legislation, signed by PA Governor Tom Wolf on October 24, 2018, was the perceived risk that the increased workload of health care providers increases the prospects that test results may be overlooked or misread. PA State Representative Marguerite Quinn, who introduced the bill, expressed worry over “two situations in which abnormal test results were not communicated to the patient, resulting in the unnecessary death of both people” in a February 20, 2015 memo. These circumstances caused her to press for better communication between imaging centers and any person who receives outpatient diagnostic imaging services.

A “significant abnormality” is defined by the Pennsylvania Medical Society (PAMED) as “a finding by a diagnostic imaging service of an abnormality which would cause a reasonably prudent person to seek additional or follow-up medical care within three months.”

Act 112 became effective on December 23, 2018 and will require imaging entities who provide outpatient services to notify their patients within 20 days of the date their results were sent to the ordering physician. The notification does not need to include a copy of the test results, but does need to include certain information, described below: